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From Futurelawer.com 29/05/11:Cracking! Let that be a lesson to everyone that prevention is better than cure!We should also all be thankful that the lawyer didn’t start by asking, “what can I do you for?” Actually, surely that’d be a breach of the Solicitors’ Code of Conduct?Oh, and seeing the word fiancé reminded me of something I overheard the other day. I haven’t ever struggled with this one but it’s such a helpful (and easily memorable) tip for those who have trouble differentiating their fiancé from their fiancée, just remember “two e’s = boobies"!(And it works a treat… providing you don’t stray into grey areas such as a middle aged chap with ‘moobs’!)

From Roll on Friday 27/05/11: For her 9 to 5, Lyndal Yaqub [pictured] toils away as an associate at Auckland firm Law & Associates, specialising in litigation and employment law. But for the rest of the time, Yaqub has a lucrative side-line as a model.Law is not a profession known for its loveliness, [b]ut maybe things are different over in New Zealand, where Yaqub manages to juggle a burgeoning legal career - she qualified as a barrister and solicitor in 2005 - with a side-line in modelling with Scout International Models. And whilst at first blush there seems to be a world of difference between the dry old world of lawyering and the glitz of modelling, she reckons there are clear similarities. "Litigation is about having a thick skin, being persuasive, and achieving positive results for your clients - as is modelling". And her employers have been generous enough to let her take time off for shoots on location or overseas.Whilst she thinks of herself first and foremo…

Apologies for the radio silence recently blawgwatchers; the Michael has been battling with a painfully stressful house move.The good news is the worst is over (I think). Rest assured - normal service shall resume shortly.

From M24Digital 11/05/11: A woman aged 36 was enabled by the justice [read court] to masturbate in her workplace because she has a strange disease.This is the story of Ana Catarina Bezerra Silvares, an employee of an accounting firm, a divorced mother of three who lives in the village Vila Velha, Espírito Santo.The woman suffers from a rare condition known as “compulsion orgasmic”, caused by a chemical alteration in the brain region of the cortex, which leads her to masturbate several times a day to relieve the deep anguish that it causes.Under this circumstance, Bezerra started legal proceedings with the company where she works that eventually won and that enables to masturbate for 15 minutes every two hours, besides using the computer to see erotic images that stimulate her desire.By the sounds of it, her desire doesn’t need any help being stimulated!! The Brazilian newspaper North Regiao reported that the woman confessed, “There was a day I had to masturbate 47 times”, ad…

From Roll on Friday 19/04/11:One's a Canadian tween singing sensation with a penchant for bowl cuts and slightly controversial anti-abortion soundbites; the other is a slope-shouldered lawyer from Pennsylvania with a penchant for personal injury and "creative litigation tactics". What they both share is the same name - Justin Bieber.Justin M Bieber Esq., Attorney at Law - who "positions clients for the best possible results" and the value of whose hair is currently unknown.I think being the namesake of Justin Beiver (sorry - Freudian slip) Beiber is a bit of a tough gig and, all things being equal, I don’t think it would do much for your legal career.While it would probably generate plenty of additional traffic for your law firm’s website, it’s safe to assume it wouldn’t be very relevant. Plus, do you want your staff directory pages to be a point and giggle arena for the internet browsing public?But that led me on to think: is a lawyer’s name important? Are c…

I don’t know if it’s just Law Actually, but my visitors seem to have gotten an awful lot dirtier recently. Some of the search terms they’ve punched into Google would make a whore blush, never mind their mothers. Other terms they’ve used are frankly just disturbing. I don’t want to repeat any of them here, not only because I don’t want to lower the tone any more than I usually do (I know - amazing isn’t it?) but also because doing so will only push me further up the rankings for those dirty phrases, exacerbating the problem.Anyway, here’s the latest batch of wacky search terms: “baywatch shauni monobrow” - Oh come on - it was the 80s. Hairy was in, right?

“setting up a new personal injury firm” - oh God, not another one.

“Behind on prostitutes” - someone who searched for this and visited law actually 7 times in rapid succession. Just how behind was he? ;-)

“knocked over listening to iPod bruise can i claim” - nope, you brought it on yourself! :p“LOVE BITES AND THE LA…

From The Law Society Gazette 28/04/11: The quiet tapping of the court stenographer will be silenced by next year to be replaced with a high-tech recording system.The Digital Audio Recording Transcription and Storage (Darts) will begin rollout in June 2011 and finish in March 2012 at each of the 97 Crown and combined court sites in England and Wales.Darts has been piloted at seven Crown Court sites since October 2009, and the Ministry of Justice said the system offers clear audio quality and backup, easy playback and a faster transcription service.A spokesperson for Her Majesty’s Court and Tribunals Service (HMCTS) said the new technology will mean the end for court loggers during proceedings, with the system updated by court clerks when witnesses are called, evidence is given and points of law granted.‘As this link between the systems has been built, there is no longer a requirement for HMCTS to continue to use loggers and stenographers,’ she added.Oh no! I can’t help but feel t…

dear michel, i am garima from india and i wasnt to be a uk lawyer or megistrate. can u tell me what should be necessary pattern to follow... kinda guide me.. thank you garimaWell there ya go. Any advice for Garima? First things first, um, what are her chances - ALL things being considered?Any ‘Megistrates’ out there who’d like to advise as to her best way forward? She’s not really fussy – she’ll happily be a lawyer in the UK instead. Give me strength!!!What I don’t really get is why someone would email a question like this when just a few minutes spent on Wikipedia would have made them much more knowledgeable. Had Garima done that, she probably wouldn’t have emailed me, but if she had, it would have likely been something much more intelligible and worthy of being answered. Is that an unreasonable thought? Oh well, Garima, you can’t win them all. And if you’re really set on a career in law, that’s a lesson you might…

Introducing Pupillage Portal 2 – the ideal game for embittered BPTC students and non-practicing barristers to play in between making those countless applications to chambers.Painstakingly puzzle over how to solve the riddle of gaining a pupillage as your alter-ego, Chell, leaps from one scrape to another with the help of her trusty portal gun. Just like the omnipotent chambers to which you apply, GLaDOS will continually goad you, trick you, mock you and ultimately reject you, leaving you a quivering heap of nerves on the floor. Yep, just like the real pupillage portal then! Available on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC.Here’s what folks are saying:

60 hours of gameplay and I’m still pupillage-less. What a bas**rd!!“If I can’t get a pupillage with my portal gun in a video game, what chance do I stand in real life? Screw this sh*t!”Heck, we never said it would be easy. Ahuwh, ahuwh, [more crying noises] … I’m not sure I want to be a lawyer anymore!Anyway, enough of that.So roll-up…

I know, I know, I wasn’t planning on watching it – I swear. But my GF switched the dreaded TV on at 9.00AM on Friday morning and it kind of stayed on the whole day.How the hell did that happen? While I didn’t buy-in to the pre-wedding hype, we had casually discussed, the week before, jumping on a train and heading the hell up to London on 29th to see what all the fuss would be about. It didn’t happen for a variety of reasons, but I concede there must have been a least a passing interest on my part. Anyhow, quite what happened to me on Friday I still don’t fully understand, but I found myself strangely swept along by the whole thing, which I’d later describe as ‘enchanting’.I don’t know that makes me borderline je ne sais quoi or just plain weird. For me, the trip Wills & Kate took in Daddy Chas’ cheeky little sports car, complete with L plate and JU5T WED number plate, was just ‘superb’ and ‘the icing on the cake’. In fact, I said so at the time. If only Harry had stuffed a bana…

Michael is a practising lawyer and accomplished cynic from the UK. He’s been blogging since his student days and can’t quite bring himself to hang up his blogging gloves just yet (they’re fingerless gloves, obviously).
He loves fussing over trivialities, seeking comfort from repetitive activities, idly reminiscing and moaning about things.